Chapter Eighty-Two
Mercy
Hours passed. In Saint Bernard's Hospital, Judy Hopps lay in silent sleep, her breaths slow and shallow, her small wrist encased in a plaster cast and her body wrapped in several places with white bandages that bore the leaks of dry blood. She was bloody, broken and resting, for now, in the nothingness and deafness that had given barriers everywhere around her.
In another room not far, Jack Savage existed in heavy sedation that which was his medically induced coma, with his breaths no less slow than Judy's. Yet, they were deeper, regulated and controlled by a large machine, which's transparent pipes of similar had been inside Judy's throat not so long ago. Pipes also led from his wrist and to a number of pieces of equipment, while a nurse stood close, checking each of them and noting down their results, amid the sterile smell, the beeping and hissing of the equipment that lived in lifelessness around.
In his another hospital room, Wolfard lay sleeping. Clawhauser, Snarlov, McHorn and many of the officers of the ZPD also relaxed in their beds, fulfilled from a long day's hard labor. A few remained awake — some searching thoroughly the city docks for all possible clues; others standing watch over the criminals locked up in the cells beneath the ZPD HQ.
Among that group of lawbreakers, only a couple of the most hardened-looking criminals remained awake, though their alertness was declining, and they clearly had no intention or chances of breaking out. Even the old dog Shuck had succumbed to exhaustion, snoring heavily as he lay on one of the few available beds; the other memmle having put up no resistance as he'd claimed the space.
Flo slept, in her own apartment, lying on her back with her arms and legs straight by her sides in the perfectly clean and perfectly tidy room of her bed, her expression clear and her features smooth. Her black-rimmed glasses were set down, on a drawer, close by her phone of warm memories-fresh.
In another part of the world, though the sun was still in the sky, the Lord of Zistopia was, curled tightly in upon himself in the largest and grandest of his bedchambers — though it made him feel no better — his sleep shallow and sorrowful, his bitterness at the rabbit's continuous existence and the stress of all his plans being held up, they were grating heavily on his mind. Sir Appleby stood watch over him — ever faithful, ever mindful, ever present.
Chief Bogo — his desk crammed with pages, the small light of the desk lamp still on — he snored with his face flat against the hard wood of the desk, while a bundle of pages was grasped still in his hoof. His every breath was threatening to blow a sheet of paper to the floor, but every time to that such possibility, it was just drawn back onto the height by Bogo's strong inhale of sound, the cycle thus continuing as it had done for several hours without end.
The buffalo coughed suddenly, a piece of saliva catching in his throat, which caused a brief splutter that finally sent the single sheet of paper falling from the edge of the desk and floating to the lonely floor.
The page fell silently beneath the light of the lamp, which illuminated the large, gray question mark where an ID photo should've been, and the details written beside it:
Name: Unknown Gender: Male
Age: Mid-twenties Species: Fox
Occupation: Firm Operative, Recruitment Address: Unknown
Accomplices: Unknown Distinguishing Marks: Unknown
Connected Crimes: Unknown Alias: Too many
Working Title: 'The Fox With the Lightest Touch'
Further details on further pages were scattered around the desk — rumors, whispers, theories and wild guesses — but nothing concrete, nothing definitive — many with the words, stamped on the front most page, 'Case Closed'. Within mumbling distance slept a red fox, a creature of sharp mind and body, whose influence was once felt throughout all the city of Zootopia — now retired to the humble career of law enforcement. Not as such for penance, but for an honest and more selfless life at least.
All people slept, their involvement in the web of affairs halted, their jobs paused and abated for a time. The clocks ticked, yet all was still. The hours passed and a shimmer of gold grew upon the line of the horizon.
A field of brown, bare soil came into view, slightly — the sky just starting to lighten with the earth all still dark. From the nearby forest, the birds began their morning chores by flying down from the luscious treetops and to the land below and the unturned soil on which they began their hopping and scratching for the search of worms and grubs.
A few found their way into the barn close by and started pecking and feasting on the split grain and seeds, as they tried to find holes in the dozens of bags of produce that laid about, pecking at the hessian bags for the delight inside.
The side entrance to the barn burst open and a rabbit rushed in. "Scat," she called, her arm waving energetically. "Go on, get!" The birds scattered to the winds, the doe's shoulders sagging with the early morning fatigue that was lingering from the recent departure of bed. "Ohh, how many times do I have to tell those kids?" she sighed, pacing in her dressing gown and picking up a broom. "How many times do I have to say 'make sure the window's shut before you lock up'…"
With the end of the broom, the rabbit jabbed the hinge of the barn's window and it snapped closed with a reassuring thunk. "There," she said, leaning on the broom, while her paw rested on her hip, "that oughta keep them out."
With a stretch, the doe pushed what sleepy warmth remained clung to her from her recently left bed, and threw down the broom upon the ground with a smile, hence, turning back towards the side entrance and marching back to the main house. There was a swing in her arms and a spring in her steps, the door falling closed behind her with the hessian bags of produce, each marked with an ink stamp that bore the words 'Hopps Family Farm'.
...
Pink dressing gown though she was wearing, Bonnie Hopps marched with the forthrightness of a Sargent Major through the corridors of the Hopps farm, which, while empty now, would be busy with a multitude of rabbits in about an hour's time. She entered into the dark bedroom where a sleeping male was lying asleep. "Come on, hon," Bonnie prompted, crossing over to the lump that snored in the bed, and patting it vigorously.
"Hmmrh? That time already?"
"Yep, another beautiful day!"
Reluctancy to rouse taking full dominion, the buck half-heartedly started pulling himself from the mattress. "Hrrh? Wha— what're we doing today?"
"Well, since market day 'couple of weeks ago, we've still got a few dozen bags of produce to take down to the village."
"Mh-market day? But we've had market day!"
The doe put a smile through Stu's sleep-educed ignorance, pushing on cheerfully with, "And now we've got to deliver the stock we've sold, collect the payment and get everything set up for the next harvest."
Stu sat up slowly and leaned back on the head of the bed, his eyes still closed as he rubbed at his ears. "Urh, my ears are numb. Think I slept on them funny." Pacing brusquely to the closed curtains of the window directly opposite the bed, Bonnie Hopps grasped the curtains and pulled them asunder, allowing the bright light of the rising sun to beam in and— Except... well, the sun hadn't actually risen yet and was still hidden just below the dark horizon.
Bonnie's nose wrinkled, disappointed in the world in general that it didn't have standards as high as hers when it came to starting early. "Laziness," she sighed, "laziness at every turn." She turned upon the TV as the next best thing, switching it on and then 'helping', as in 'forcing', Stu out of bed and into active condition, while the light and noise of the television filled the room.
"Bon, I'm up, I'm up!"
"Come on now, Stu, into these."
The rabbit looked bleary at the object of clothing pushed into his paws, staring at it as he tried to get his vision to clear. "What is it," he mumbled, "pants or shirt? Bon?" Lowering the whatever-it-was, Stu turned towards his wife and saw her frozen posture and her gawk locked on the flashy screen.
Squinting, the buck sleepily managed to get his numb ears to raise, and the muffled sounds and blurred vision cleared to reveal the image of the news channel, with a reporter speaking on the screen.
"— and that it was Officer Judy Hopps, the hero who saved our city a year ago, who was the victim of this most brutal and violent attack. And while the ZPD have failed to issue a statement or speak with any of our reporters at this time, it is now known…"
"Bonnie? Bonnie, what's going—"
"Put your pants on," the rabbit whispered.
"Bon?"
"Just put the damn pants on!"
...
As the sun climbed higher into the sky — as dawn ingratiated itself upon the sky, as Ra was reborn, as Helios began his journey in his fiery chariot, as the wolves Skoll and Hati chased Sól up through the sky — a shaft of light fell upon the face of Nick Wilde.
His eye slowly cracking open, he gazed up blankly, expressionlessly at the ceiling. He felt like shit. There was no polite way of saying it. It felt as though he'd spent the whole of the previous evening drinking and looking into bright lights. His body felt weak and taken with a sense of deep sickness, his eyes were aching as though someone had rubbed gravel into them, and his mind buzzed with slow bleakness that refused to shift.
He tried for a moment to sit up in the bed, but the emotional strength refused to come, and his arms fell limply by his sides with a thin groan. His face tightened with the memories of the previous day, which got him wincing and shutting his eyes tight, due to the image of the naked, bloodied rabbit he had held in his arms at that repugnant harbor.
Wilde had been through many torments in his life, many unhappy moments and many things that had left him broken. Some might've assumed that such would hadron a person against the torments of the world, yet in this moment that belief did the fox no good.
His teeth biting down, his face wincing and contorting with pain, a low whimper escaped the fox's body. A piteous sight. A tortured form. In the next room the whimper that had grown to a hushed sob that awoke the sleeping buffalo from his mental absence. Sitting up slowly from his desk, Bogo took the sheet of paper that had stuck to his face and pulled it away, looking nonplussed down at the sheet as he rubbed a hoof across his forehead, while stretching his stiffened back.
He grumbled quietly as he pulled himself to his feet, flinching as his back gave pierce. "Damn it," he muttered, "Rose told me I had to keep an eye on my posture..." The sound of the fox in the next room stirred the Chief from his self-analysis, a look of panic crossing his face — and trepidation, as he noticed the paperwork all around him, the pages and pages of hearsay and rumors about a certain member of The Firm.
Bogo saw a single page, which had fallen to the floor — an identification overview, half of which was riddled with the word 'Unknown' — and a single word escaped like breath against wind, "Wilde…"
In the other room, the fox had regained control from his outburst and now just sat, miserably, on the side of the bed, staring down disinterestedly at the floor several feet below — his mind on anything but getting dressed. "Judy," he whispered, wretchedly, "what do I do? What do I do?" He felt that she would've told him to keep on fighting, keep on pushing and keep on trying, no matter how hard or bleak things got.
Her words when they had parted, they rang inside his head, 'The training at the academy... it's supposed to grind you down, that's how they test what you're really made of. The only way to beat it, to show them you can face up to any danger, that you really can make the world a better place, is to keep on fighting.'
'Show them what you're made of, Slick,' Judy had shouted her last words to him, as he had left for the academy, just when the train door had slid closed and as the whistle had blown with the fill of steam around the station. 'Go make me proud!'
The image faded slowly from the fox's mind. It left him dazed, confused, his whole world spinning sickeningly. He breathed slowly in a shiver, because Judy's words filled the void around his disgruntled psyche. "It got me through the academy, Carrots," he said to himself, his voice pained but unfaltering and certain. "It can get me through this, too." He had to do that for her sake…
The door opened with a knock, and the Chief cleared his throat softly, but failed to draw the fox from the deepness of his thoughts. "Wilde?" Again, nothing. He stepped closer to the fox, his arm slipping beneath him and raising him off the bed, thus, lowering him down on the floor.
It took Nick a moment to find his footing — the Chief holding his weight, while Nick's feet scrambled at the floor in disability. When he was able to hold himself upright, he turned up slowly towards the Chief, his emerald eyes meeting steadily with Bogo's. "Thanks…"
"Wilde, we ughm..." Bogo lost his unprepared words and bought himself time with a lungful sigh, his conviction and strength appearing to empty with it, as his figure slumped a little and his gaze lowered to the floor. "It... doesn't matter. We can talk about it later. For now, let's just…"
His tail hanging limply on the floor — his expression faintly confused — Nick gazed up at the Chief. "Bogo?"
"You want a shower, Nick? There's... through there. Help yourself, I'll make something to, guh…" Grunting, the buffalo turned and left the room, the fox watching after him with a mind that was too overloaded, with the events of last night, to be able to give any thought to Bogo's motives or the subject of his conversation. Much of the past few hours felt as though a distant dream, with only moments of intently painful and vivid memories, among the faded exhilaration and fears that surrounded it.
Nick recalled some mention of Clawhauser's presence and that he'd saved his own fur in some way by calling out and distracting the Chief, but the details and the outcome... Exactly like a night of drinks, with memory loss and all...
Shortly after, the fox found his way into the Chief's bathroom. It was a massive room, though if he were Bogo's size it would've felt cramped. The room was clean, for the most part, but it was let down by the chipped tiles and low-quality appliances that furnished its insides. Hardly what he expected from the chief of police. Nick nodded to Bogo to note what he was doing, and pulled the bathroom door closed behind him. His musky clothes were stripped and he put them on the radiator as there was nowhere else to hang them.
His deep, russet fur bare to the room, the fox stepped into the cubical, crouching onto all fours on the floor, before, springing up high into the air and clutching on to the part of the shower that was bolted to the wall.
Clasping with his claws to the pipe, Nick turned the dials and water gushed forth from the shower head. He held onto the pipe with his feet and paws, while adjusting the temperature and using his tail to judge if it was ready for his body.
It was a tricky and exhausting process, greatly owing to the psychological conditions under which he was living currently, yet the shower was needed. The opportunity to wash himself beneath a torrent of hot water, and to try and scrub away some of the deep sense of wretched fear. It was an opportunity that was sought like food amidst starvation.
Frustrated by the insensitivity the shower seemed to work with, and bouts of over-sensitivity, the fox grunted heavily and jumped down to the tiles, his hackles rising and his shoulders hunching, as the icy water drenched his back. His expression scrunched, while his breath left in a growled whimper to the exhibit of his predatory teeth. His eyes pulled tight against the torment of the world and the sharp daggers of cold that coated down his back.
A moment later, the daggers decided to cease the onslaught. At last... life saw fit to bestow some mercy, and the temperature of the water finally crept up to the margin of warmth. His breaths found stability, and Nick began to weep, grateful beyond reasoning that fate or chance or whatever governed his life was giving him this small gift. Such a small respite, such a small convenience, but such a pillar… It was a sign of hope for the fox to cling to. It was a ridiculous thing to think, he knew, but with his emotional state in the mess it was, he took to it, held it and felt reluctant to let it go.
Through the sobs — the tears that were lost to the comforting pleasure of the soft warmth the shower water embraced him with — the shaking figure of the fox managed to speak, his voice uttering the words, "It's all going to be okay... just maybe, it'll all be okay…"
Author's notes:
Hesitance jumps around your mind,
Grooms decision thus chosen blind.
Your thoughts most succulent of snack,
All delivered by luscious feedback.
So don't hide like a tiny shrew,
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